Real world reviews & comments from actual usersGeneral

I've also pre-ordered through P4U, but I've ordered the black. I've always been on edge wondering if I will in fact receive it tomorrow after the confirmation of delays. Especially considering that all the demos I've seen and the ones I've been too have been silver versions. I phoned P4U at around 17:00 today to check on my order and they said everything was still on track for delivery tomorrow. I'm just hoping I don't get the email you received indicating no black available, think I would just die. Have been looking soooo forward to having this phone tomorrow as I'm travelling next week.

I will update on here if and when I do receive it however or with any communications I get from P4U for those on here that may be wondering.

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Surprisingly fast service from Phones4U, considering they had to change my order from black to white they still managed to get my order delivered on Saturday morning (16/03). Absolutely stunning and amazing phone. The screen is just fantastic and the Boomsound is actually not a gimmick, instead it puts my external desk top speakers (low to mid range Logitech) to shame.

Battery hasn't been through its full cycle yet. I've obviously been playing with it non stop since Saturday morning and it's now 23:50 Sunday evening and I still have 43% battery. Hoping this trend keeps up as the battery was the only subject I worried about in the device. The camera so far is also very impressive, at the time have been comparing to my girlfriends iPhone 5 and my old GS3 with stills and video and the HTC is such a stellar performer in this degree.

Still figuring out the events and Zoe thing, looks to be quite useful for holidays and social events but day to day it's a little impractical.

Something that may be if interest to potential UK buyers, my handset was apparently locked to Orange but as soon as received it I popped in my 3 SIM and it works. This is despite the agent assuring me it was locked and in the contract agreement stating the phone is carrier locked. That's not to say you might in fact land up with a locked device but chances are it's PROBABLY unlocked. Just something to think about.

thanks for the review mate. Looking forward to this dropping in NZ. Thinking I might keep my GS3 and use that purely as an MP3 player, the wolfson dac is great and just use the One as purely a phone, keep the storage free with only a 32GB version, bit cheaper and buy a 64GB SD for the GS3. 80GB of storage purely for music and I can just empty out all the apps and everything else. Best of both worlds.

Thanks for that review.
I had planned to wait for the One and the GS4 to be released to have as play with both, and was probably going to hang fire for the 64GB One if that were the winner (probably as I hate the plastic on the Galaxys).....anyhoo, dropped the OneX last Friday, only a small chip in the side of the screen, but its really annoying for me, so just placed my order for the new One, should be delivered early next week, and the cheapest place I could find it is from Handtec at

Thought I'd throw in an update as the days go by. Particularly the battery performance.

I've had the device for 4 days and have been using it heavily in all aspects (HD Video streaming, music, Internet, communications and so on). With this kind of usage I'm currently averaging at around 22 hours. With normal use I assume the device would easily pass the full day mark. Something to bare in mind is my battery is subject to the biggest juice drain of all...really bad signal reception all day everyday so far. So to be fair, I'm really quite happy with the battery performance so far.

However, I've noticed that the phones is taking a little over 3 hours to charge
This is perplexing because of the faster charging time technology incorporated within the Qualcomm chip set (Think it's 30% faster charging times)
Could any other users maybe confirm the same problem or is it just my handset? Now this problem isn't really too concerning as I'll eventually get the cycle to charge overnight so it won't bother me, though if you were out of juice during the day and on the move it could pose a problem if you're not carrying a portable charging pack.

Apart from the above the phone is still proving to be everything it was hyped to be.

Still learning new things as I go along. Decided to play around with the IR blaster and TV remote functionality. Setting it up was really simple and straight forward and took less than a minute. I can now completely control my Sky+ box, TV and my home theatre set. The UI is really nice and simple too, the satellite menu is loaded with thumbnails of shows making it really easy to pick out what you know and want. To get the show you want on you TV simply requires that you tap the thumbnail and it immediately pops up on the screen.

Can still record, stop or rewind live TV feed etc. You can also set-up reminders and recordings to roll on later.

I've also had the MHL unit from my HTC One X so those of you wondering if the One will work with it, yes it does!
It's still the most convenient feature if you're a fan of streaming the awesome deals HTC Watch has every so often (0.49p movie weekends) or showing friends an family video recordings and pictures etc. All of this done without getting out of the chair as it's all wireless.

If anyone has any questions or features that they want me to test, fire away.

Thanks for keeping us up to speed. Like you, battery is a big concern for me and I've heard not so great things until your review. So definitely looking forward to more comments in the coming days if you are able to provide them. Many thanks and welcome to AF.

Any current owners notice how sensitive the ONE is to scratches? I can't wait to dump my iphone 4s and get this once it hits the US. I DO NOT want a case on it, so I'm hoping it's pretty scratch-proof for normal wear and tear.

Any current owners notice how sensitive the ONE is to scratches? I can't wait to dump my iphone 4s and get this once it hits the US. I DO NOT want a case on it, so I'm hoping it's pretty scratch-proof for normal wear and tear.

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Watch all the way to the end, it's only 18 seconds. You will be surprised.

Any current owners notice how sensitive the ONE is to scratches? I can't wait to dump my iphone 4s and get this once it hits the US. I DO NOT want a case on it, so I'm hoping it's pretty scratch-proof for normal wear and tear.

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I've had mine for a week now and while I received the flip cover with the handset I've never used it. Mostly because it's just such a nice phone and I don't want to hide it such a beautiful device. In saying that I have ordered a transparent TPU cover from Amazon because I do tend to drop phones or have them slip out of my pockets.

But for the moment mine has been on tables wooden and steel (though it wasn't dragged across the surfaces because lets face it, who does that ), dropped once but only from the arm rest of the sofa onto carpet then rolled onto the tiled floor underneath. After the brief heart attack following that drop I checked it over and nothing wrong or any marks. The one thing I was worried about on the back of the phone was the camera lens getting scratches as most of my other HTC phones have experienced as they tend to design them with the camera jutting out from the rest of the body so the camera is always the first thing to come into contact with the surface.

With the One, the camera is EVER so slightly recessed and this may help to prevent light surface scratches. However, being so slight it may even prove to be no different. Time will tell but for the moment I definitely think you can put your mind at ease and not worry about scratches on this phone providing you don't use it as a skateboard

I'm confused. What about that review from CNET UK where the guy put his HTC One in the same pocket as his house keys and claimed there were scratches all over and the paint chipped off?

Is the HTC One scratch-proof or not?

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Lol...nothing is scratch proof! Let's say together...NOTHING!

You will surely be disappointed if you have those sort of expectations.

My advice...Pick up a clear TPU case and call it a day. I love the look of the phone but I will be putting it straight into a case as soon as it comes out of the box when I get it. One slip onto pavement, concrete, the old I forgot it was on my lap while getting out of the car nightmare, etc...Case it and breath easy ; )

You will surely be disappointed if you have those sort of expectations.

My advice...Pick up a clear TPU case and call it a day. I love the look of the phone but I will be putting it straight into a case as soon as it comes out of the box when I get it. One slip onto pavement, concrete, the old I forgot it was on my lap while getting out of the car nightmare, etc...Case it and breath easy ; )

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Ok. Forget i said scratch-proof and replace with anti-scratch instead. I'm still confused after watching that You Tube clip and the CNET review.

Slightly off top but a really big thing for me is the camera, I use the camera quite a bit & wandered if anyone luckily enough with phone could upload some random shots; inside, outside, close ups and scenery, etc.
Really can't make mind up with htc One, looks amazing but tech reviews say battery & camera not good. Seems battery is more than ample according to this thread. Real life photo's from everyday users would give a great indication!!

Slightly off top but a really big thing for me is the camera, I use the camera quite a bit & wandered if anyone luckily enough with phone could upload some random shots; inside, outside, close ups and scenery, etc.
Really can't make mind up with htc One, looks amazing but tech reviews say battery & camera not good. Seems battery is more than ample according to this thread. Real life photo's from everyday users would give a great indication!!

Here we go, my first post of actual (perceived) worth. My initial quick review of my brand new HTC One. Please remember where I make a statement below like 'x is better than y' it is purely my subjective opinion and i understand and realise others will not echo my thoughts.

I got home about five hours ago and have pretty much not left it alone at all since then. It was on 74% power and is now on 40% and plugged in whilst I upload some music to the phone.

I can't give any comments on battery life until i've used it for a few days. It should get a good workout tomorrow though as I am off out for most of the day shooting.

Build quality
It's spot on. No gaps, no dead pixels, no dents, dings or scratches. Perfect. It feels great in the hand, has a pleasing weight to it; not too light, not too heavy. It looks and feels a million dollars.

Screen
Dear god! The best screen I have ever seen on a smartphone! No ghosting, no tears and videos are crisp, clear and extremely high quality. I am very very impressed with the screen. The finger glide action is crystal smooth and the viewing angles are actually very good indeed. At the moment, colours seem vivid. I gather from other reviews that the screen colours look slightly washed out against other phones. If that is the case, you will not notice unless you are looking for it. For me, they are perfectly fine. Darks are dark and lights are light and all the colours in between seem rich and vivid; so I can't complain.

Beats Audio
Loud or what? Incredibly clear and distortion-free no matter whether you are playing Mussorgsky or Megadeth (I tried). Forget about booting up that phone in a quiet room like a bedroom at night or a library though! Try as I might, I couldn't get it to distort at all, no matter what I played through it.

Sense 5
Very good indeed. Easily better than my experiences with stock Touchwiz on my Samsung S3 and S2. Very smooth scrolling and the icons look sharp and have obviously had a rework for the new high-def screen. I thought I would dislike the vertically scrolling App drawer but it feels fine to use. I wish I could put more icons on my homescreen though but that will require a launcher. Maybe i'll do that in the not too distant future. Blinkfeed was interesting for a while but I found it very cluttered so I have removed all feeds from it. I will try it out again in a few days once the initial small-child-at-Christmas feeling has subsided a bit. As I mentioned in another post somewhere, Blinkfeed would be miles better if we could add in our own feeds or mail accounts. I would have no issues in having that as my home screen then. Until that time, it has been relegated to another screen and emptied of feeds.

Afterthoughts:

HTC Sync Manager
Very crappy piece of software that tries to be smart and immediately started trying to add in over twelve terabytes of movies and music (yes you read right). I imagine I would probably have had to come back sometime late next week once it had finished. I dislike the way it tries to intelligently scan for all your media. I have a lot of media across my RAID and NAS and so I have had to manually delete everything from HTC Sync Manager as there was no easy way that I could find to do it en masse.

For anyone who is interested, and against all my predictions, Blinkfeed is excellent.

I'm coming from a gs3 running on Apex Launcher. This is the first android phone I both love, and more importantly have no intention of putting a launcher onto.

For the very first time (excluding nexus 4 which I havent used but have heard this is the case) all transitions etc are consistent and the whole UI has a (sorry if this is a dirty word around here) 'iOS' level of fluidity.

What I've done is delete all my android screens so now all I see is blink feed and I do app navigation through the app browser. Sounds a bit geeky but the blinkfeed news story pictures are beautifully rendered and remind me of an ultra-sharp flipboard surgically ingratiated into your main home screen.

Still in the honeymoon period right now but absolutely loving it. Apex was awesome but at the back of my mind I always hated the 'messiness' of having touchwiz running in the background and kinda sweeping it under the carpet with apex just so I can have a decent ui. Not to mention having to faff around with two sets of settings instead of one. Until now had always had a love/hate thing with android - as far as I was concerned if you have to add a launcher the product is a fail.

Sense 5 is beautiful - have been rinsing the battery already just because I keep bringing it out to play with. Best phone I've used. And the second most beautiful (sorry but Nokia n9 is still at the top).

Here's my review after six days of ownership. This is a tweaked and updated version that has been based on my review on this page just above. Some of the info has remained the same but I have added in a lot of new info based on my experience of the phone during my first week of ownership.

Please remember where I make a statement below like 'x is better than y' it is purely my subjective opinion and I understand and realise others will not echo my thoughts.

This is my first HTC phone, having currently got an iPhone 5 and a Samsung Galaxy S2 which has been replaced by the HTC. I did have a Galaxy S3 but thought it was a POS.

Battery
Wow, i'm impressed. I ran it alongside my iPhone 5 and both had emails pushed to it at the same time. I received and replied to about five sms messages on the iPhone and about fifteen on the HTC and had maybe twenty emails to both devices over that time. I took them both off charge on Monday morning at about midday and the iPhone died at 11pm on the Tuesday night. The HTC didn't die until approximately 5pm on the Wednesday although it did have power saver on for the last fifteen percent. I am a light to moderate user of any phone and I am truly impressed that the battery on the HTC is a real stormer. For instance, I took the phone off charge at about 20:00 hours on Wednesday and it is now 20:30 on Friday and the phone is still alive without power-save on at 7%. This battery is way better than my iPhone and that was impressive in itself. I couod not be happier with this result. I don't care what any of the reviews say, for me this battery is brilliant and that's what matters.

Build materials and Build quality
It's spot on. No gaps, no dead pixels, no dents, dings or scratches. Perfect. It feels great in the hand, has a pleasing weight to it; not too light, not too heavy. It looks and feels a million dollars. The aluminium is beautifully designed and the volume buttons sit flush with the side of the phone and have been cut in a concentric circle pattern, which is one of those little touches that shows that someone has really thought about this phone when they designed it. Sometimes I miss the power button with my huge spade-claw hands but that is more to do with me getting used to the power button being on that side (remember, I am an iPhone user so the power button on the top is perfectly natural to me).

Screen
Dear god! The best screen I have ever seen on a smartphone! No ghosting, no bleed, no tears and videos are crisp, clear and extremely high quality. I am very very impressed with the screen. The finger glide action is crystal smooth and the viewing angles are actually very good indeed. At the moment, colours seem vivid. I gather from other reviews that the screen colours look slightly washed out against other phones. If that is the case, you will not notice unless you are looking for it. For me, they are perfectly fine. Darks are dark and lights are light and all the colours in between seem rich and vivid; so I can't complain.

Beats Audio
Loud or what? Incredibly clear and distortion-free no matter whether you are playing Mussorgsky or Megadeth (I tried). Forget about booting up that phone in a quiet room like a bedroom at night or a library though! Try as I might, I couldn't get it to distort at all, no matter what I played through it. Definitely the loudest phone I have ever heard and has made me jump a few times because of this.

Sense 5
Very good indeed. Easily better than my experiences with stock Touchwiz on my Samsung S3 and S2. Very smooth scrolling and the icons look sharp and have obviously had a rework for the new high-def screen. I thought I would dislike the vertically scrolling App drawer but it feels fine to use. I wish I could put more icons on my homescreen though but that will require a launcher. Maybe i'll do that in the not too distant future. Blinkfeed was interesting for a while but I found it very cluttered so I have removed all feeds from it. I will try it out again in a few days once the initial small-child-at-Christmas feeling has subsided a bit. As I mentioned in another post somewhere, Blinkfeed would be miles better if we could add in our own feeds or mail accounts. I would have no issues in having that as my home screen then. Until that time, it has been relegated to another screen and emptied of feeds.

The stock UI has some great touches and the various inbuilt apps are lovely and uncluttered to use. There isn't the sense that HTC have tried to cram as much in whether it will fit or not. Again, to me it looks like real thought has been given to the apps they have in the UI and they haven't tried to dazzle users with a function that looks cool but will never practically be used by 95% of the populace (i'm looking at you Samsung 'Popup Play' feature).

Camera
I am not David Bailey, so I don't care if my photos are not the best in the world. I have an expensive DSLR if I want to take exceptional quality pictures anyway. The camera on the HTC is perfectly adequate for my needs. It's not the best out there for a smartphone, sure, but it is perfectly serviceable and it is far from the worst. Low light photos are great and they easily capture more light than my naked eye can see. Zoe is fun to use and I have already found it useful for capturing 'that perfect shot' and discarding the rest. The time from tapping the camera app icon to taking an auto-focus shot is approximately one second, which is astonishing and way quicker than I was expecting.

Afterthoughts: - HTC Sync Manager
I'm new to the HTC and found this to be a very crappy piece of software that tries to be smart and immediately started trying to add in over twelve terabytes of movies and music (yes you read right). I imagine I would probably have had to come back sometime late next week once it had finished. I dislike the way it tries to intelligently scan for all your media. I have a lot of media across my RAID and NAS and so I have had to manually delete everything from HTC Sync Manager as there was no easy way that I could find to do it en masse. It does however allow you to port an iPhone backup straight to your HTC which for me was an absolute godsend.

I think I over did it with cases. Every day I get a new one in the mail, and still have some more, and screen protectors on the way.. and will probably purchase a few more between now and when I actually get the phone.. At least I know (by holding the cases) what it will look like in proximity to my hand!!!

I think I over did it with cases. Every day I get a new one in the mail, and still have some more, and screen protectors on the way.. and will probably purchase a few more between now and when I actually get the phone.. At least I know (by holding the cases) what it will look like in proximity to my hand!!!